My life is food. I grow it and I prepare it and I LOVE to eat it.

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Maybe I’m overdoing it, but in addition to the whole “grow yer own” thing, we’ve pretty much divested ourselves of two cars in our household, leaving us with one hard working Hyundai Tuscon that we all share. We unloaded the first “extra” car intentionally. Two leases, two insurance payments and almost two times the gas didn’t make sense given that we had all kinds of things we’d rather spend that money on and we were feeling just a bit guilty about the carbon footprint thing. Besides, our daughter, Cass, still had a car so we figured we’d make do. Then Cass made a bad left turn and we were down to one. It’s been interesting. She doesn’t want to spend more money either. She’s saving for the obligatory trip to Europe post high-school-and-a-couple-of-years-of-college, so we’re becoming very creative and learning to share nicely.

This leads me to this evening’s post. Our nephew, Sam, celebrated his 10th birthday tonight, so I went over to Libby’s house for dinner and the traditional kissing of the new hamster (named Scooter by the way, and cute as a rodent could ever get). No sooner had I taken my first sip of wine when Cass called to ask if she could walk over to pick up the car so she could go to Burnaby. I figured I’d find my way home somehow, so why not. As it started to grow dusk outside, I thought about the 7,500 steps I’d walked and how I’d really rather make it the 10,000 you’re supposed to walk everyday. (Did you know that? An adult SHOULD walk 10,000 steps a day; a child about 14,000. Who knew? I’d swear I’d be a happier — and larger — person if I didn’t read so much!) So, at about 8:30, I set out in my flip flops to trek home.

It’s about 1.5 km (~1 mile) to our house from Libby’s, I figure. And in between is our garden. That was the “carrot on the stick” so to speak. It’s gotten quite a bit warmer since the weekend. It was 19 degrees (about 70F) yesterday and today, so I know the garden will be happier. I figured that I could check out our little plants and give them a drink. After a stop at the store for some cream (look at me, shopping on foot just like I’m 18 again!) I got to the garden. It’s getting very “full” looking. Everything is just that much wider and taller. And, since I put more fish fertilizer on it on Sunday, I think it’s a bit greener, too. The arugulas and lettuces all want to flower, so I nipped off all that I could get my hands on. I think you’re supposed to, and if anyone knows something to the contrary, please leave me a comment!

I walked around and admired everything and sparked up the hose for a good watering. It’s looking good. After catching half an inning of the women’s softball game in the adjacent field and visiting with perfect strangers, I headed home…